The four Sphaeralceas (Globe Mallows)
shown on this page enjoy hot and dry conditions. Sphaeralcea coccinea and Sphaeralcea parvifolia often spread over large areas putting
on a very eye-catching wildflower show. Click to see one such show along the Colorado River.

"Sphaer" is Greek for "a sphere or globe" and
"alcea" is Greek for "a
mallow".

Sphaeralcea
coccinea is a very common and variable plant of the low
foothills and semi-desert regions. It loves sandy, dry, open ground and often
forms large colonies from its spreading roots. Leaves are cut in many divisions and appear a silver
green because the green leaf is covered with fine, white hairs. Plants range from four inches to sixteen inches tall with
the larger plants looking, from a distance, very much like S.
parvifolia or S. grossulariifolia. In most of southwestern Colorado, the plants are four to eight inches tall, in colonies, and with finely dissected leaves (as shown at left in this and in this typical spring display.

"Coccin" is Latin for "scarlet".

Thomas Nuttall,famed
18th century botanist and Professor of Botany at Harvard, collected this
species "From the River Platte to the Rocky Mountains" in 1811
and named the plant Malva coccinea. Per Axel Rydberg
renamed it Sphaeralcea coccinea in 1913.

Sphaeralcea
grossulariifolia typically grows 12-24 inches tall but may be over 30 inches. Flowers are in tight bunches, leaves are deeply cut, and the plant is quite hairy.

Sphaeralcea
grossulariifolia was not discovered in Colorado until about 2004 and it is known from just a few locations there. It is, as the map below indicates, wide-spread in the other Four Corners states.

Sphaeralcea
grossulariifolia was named Sida grossulariaefolia by William Jackson Hooker and George Arnot in 1838 from a collection made by members of the Hudson Bay Company in Idaho in 1837. Per Axel Rydberg gave the present name in 1913.

The specific epithet, "grossulariifolia" refers to some perceived resemblance of the foliage of this plant to that of some member(s) of the genus Grossularia (now Ribes) in the Gooseberry Family, scientifically called Grossulariaceae. The family and genus were named by Augustin de Candolle in the early 1800s, sometime prior to the 1838 naming of this species.

The plants shown here may actually be quite tall versions of S. coccinea. The two species are very similar, supposedly distinguished by the arrangement of the flowers: S. coccinea flowers are in a raceme, i.e., single and stalked from the main stem. S. grossulariifolia flowers are in a compact thyrse (in a branching, compact structure), and in Utah flora expert, Stanley Welsh's words, "with usually more than one flower per node". Note the word "usually" and also that Welsh states, "some specimens [of S. coccinea) approach if not pass into S. grossulariifolia...."

Throughout the Four Corners area, the two species have distinctly different growth forms: S. grossulariifolia grows to several feet tall in individual plants; S. coccinea grows to less than a foot tall and spreads by underground roots so that there are almost always dozens of plants in a small area.

This lovely Mallow is easily distinguished from
the other two shown on this page by its linear (long, narrow)
leaves. It enjoys loose, sandy soils in all the Four Corners
states and
grows from eight to twenty-five inches tall with many flowers covering
many stems. Stems and leaves have a gray-green cast. Notice
a number of straw-colored stems from last year's growth.

Charles Wright first collected this species in
1851 and Asa Gray named it Malvastrum leptophyllum. It was
renamed Sphaeralcea leptophylla in 1913 by Per Axel Rydberg. The Greek "lepto" + "phylla" means "fine-leaved".

Sphaeralcea parvifolia
also loves the
hot and dry and can put on massive displays of flowers in Canyon Country. In
2004, and even more so in 2005, hundreds of thousands of plants bloomed profusely for weeks in the Four
Corners states. (Click
to see S. parvifolia putting
on a show along the Colorado River.)

Species present in state and nativeSpecies present in state and exoticSpecies not present in state

County Color Key

Species present and not rareSpecies present and rareSpecies extirpated (historic)Species extinctSpecies noxiousSpecies exotic and presentNative species, but adventive in stateEradicatedQuestionable presence